Oh, c’mon, we can live without plastic bags

Here are two things a plastic bag ban will not do: It will not save the planet, and it will not ruin your life.

So, with this remarkably contentious issue due for a vote before the Dallas City Council on Wednesday, let us stop making exaggerated and overstated claims. The fate of human civilization is not teetering on the razor’s edge here.

At best, curtailing the use of flimsy, cheap, nondegradable plastic bags (“ban” is a misnomer) might trigger an incremental reduction in our staggering garbage burden. At worst, it will pose a minor consumer inconvenience.

Human beings are trainable and adaptable, and there’s no reason to suppose they can’t get used to this minor but ubiquitous change.

People who wailed that we’d be hip-deep in filth if garbage pickup went to once a week have somehow managed to cope. Critics who blasted recycling as a symbolic feel-good fad became habituated to sorting their trash without a second thought.

But in the long run — with all due respect to my buen amigo Steve Blow, who wrote last week that banning plastic bags is ineffective and meaningless — we’re better off without them. You don’t use a laundry basket or a wheelbarrow once and throw it away. When did we decide that a free, disposable container every time somebody buys a light bulb or a sack of Fritos is an inalienable right?

I’m not addressing either retailers or plastic bag producers here, since they obviously have economic considerations involved. But I genuinely believe average chumps can adapt to a bag ban, because I can do it, and I’m the laziest person I know.

But let’s look at some of the most common objections to banning plastic bags, or at least limiting their use, as Dallas contemplates a modest fee-per-bag charge:

1. It’s inconvenient. I always forget to take the reusable bags into the store.

You don’t forget your wallet, do you? Nope, because you won’t get your groceries without it. If stores quit giving away plastic bags, shoppers will start remembering to carry their reusables.

2. It’s nobody’s business but mine whether I use plastic bags.

Nobody’s saying you can’t use them. They’re just saying you can’t keep getting them for free every time you buy something.

3. I need plastic bags — as a responsible pet owner, I reuse them.

I’m sensitive to this point, which we might delicately call the “dog walk exception” or the “litter box proviso.” I reuse plastic bags for this purpose myself. But there are a) other household throwaways that can be employed and b) cheap pet supplies made for this specific purpose.

Having several problems is not a good excuse for ignoring all of them.

5. The nanny-state government is trying to tell me what to do.

The nanny-state government already tells you what to do, and this isn’t the final outrage that’s going to send people swarming into the streets with pitchforks.

Honestly, plastic bags are one consumer product I think we’re ultimately better off without. They’re ugly and wasteful; they travel great distances on the lightest breeze; and you personally will return to ashes and dust a lot sooner than they will. Why not try to change this one small habit?

It won’t save the world. But it won’t hurt as much as you think, either.

To post a comment, log into your chosen social network and then add your comment below. Your comments are subject to our Terms of Service and the privacy policy and terms of service of your social network. If you do not want to comment with a social network, please consider writing a letter to the editor.